Environmental sensors and detectors that sense physical characteristics, events, phenomena, or objects are used in many industrial, chemical, security, and military environments to detect events or the presence of objects. Some sensors are battery powered, allowing them to be remote and/or wireless, and allowing flexibility in varying applications. Additionally, some sensors are used to detect uncommon or irregular events, remaining in a standby mode for significant amounts of time before an event occurs to trigger the sensor. Power consumption in the standby mode is of significant interest because battery powered sensors may exhaust the energy in the battery while in standby mode, and therefore a sensor with relatively higher power consumption requires more frequent battery replacement or recharging, increasing costs, effort, and complexity to maintain.